Angkor Wat to Angkor Wat

‘Angkor Wat', the biggest temple complex on the planet. A Hindu King and his dynasty gave it all in making Angkor the biggest and the richest human settlement of the region and some say the entire world in that era. An era which when it ended in 1350 already had under it 400 years of glory. Like any other kingdom in its fag end, Angkor of the 1300’s also had a relatively meek death. The buddhist came from Thailand and conquered, and the statues of the hindu gods were replaced by idols of Buddha! The walls however lay untouched. Untouched and kept to fade away, slowly into being almost overrun by wild forests growing all around and into them. 

When I choose my travel destinations, I usually skip places with the above description. Age old history and monuments related to ‘the era’ hold no excitement for me. But something of the size of Angkor Wat in Siem Reap, Cambodia had to be done for touring purposes, just like maybe the Taj Mahal in India for a foreigner.  

In the last 48 hours, my group saw all the important temple sights. We woke up at 0430 hours on the first day and saw the sun coming up from behind the main temple. The sun shone from behind the stone and onto the few thousand tourists waiting on this side of the water pond, to take the reflection of the temple against the orange sky of dawn. Each one of us had the temple photo pass(we had to wait in a serpentine line to have our tired faces photographed), that gave us a full day access into the UNESCO sight. Some other tourists had taken their passes for 3 and a few for 7 days. I don't know how in a place over run by tourists will one be able to find peace with the monument, even if it was visiting it for a week. 

Angkor, the main temple at 0600 hours

The mad rush of tourists to take capture Angkor at Sunrise

I tried not to be over cynical with the place, so I kept my view as unbiased as possible, by not entering any of the temple. The structures however are unique to what I have experienced in the man made ancient world. But they are still man made, and thats why the only place I really felt was different, was the Wat Prong. Wat(temple) Prong(i cant remember) is different not because of its architecture, but the way nature destroyed what men made. The trees grew and they kept on growing since the 1400’s. The trees that grew in the soil were fine but then some started to grow on the roof and the roots give the structure its uniqueness. It rains and it is really rains in the wet season. The leaves from the trees after drying fell on the roof, which after decomposing, became the fertiliser. The seeds came later and took to becoming plants getting their water from the moss growing on the roof. The plant grew and when the moss was insufficient to provide the moisture, the roots reached for all the places they could suck water from, even if it meant to drop down 10 feet into the soil.

The roots reaching for the ground 

As a group and even as an individual this was my first time in Siem Reap. With the mad rush of tourists I might not want to promote it in the future. Irrespective what I think, everyone wants to strike Angkor off their ‘to visit’ list, and tourists (especially westerners) will continue to flock to Cambodia and in it Angkor Wat. With a $20 entry fee and at minimum of 4 - 5 thousand daily visitors the place has its economy intact for another 40 years.

But it is something that happened 40 years back, that caught my attention. I had  heard about the Khmer rouge in the same context as Hitler or the Bosnian war. We cant merit the ill fame of a human calamity by the number of lives lost. But if we have to arrange in descending order the ruthlessness of humans towards other human beings with the objective to achieve total control over a piece of land, Cambodia, and what happened here between 1975 and 1978 would certainly be in the top 5 human tragedies on our planet. 

I never intended to visit this part of the world and nor were / are the media channels interested in covering what happened in Cambodia in the dark years. So, I only heard of the full extent of the Khmer Rouge horror when I came to Siem Reap. 

What happens when a totalitarian regime dictates all the educated city dwellers to go and work in forced labour on rice fields? Then adding to that the village folk between the age of 15 - 20 yrs, are handed over the reign of the capital Phnom Phen, which they hold firm with a machine gun. 

Well what happens is 2 million people disappearing in 3 years from a population of 9 million. The Vietnamese then ruled the country for another 6 years, wiping out a further one million. The Berlin wall fell in 1989 and with it communism vanished from Europe. But it took another 20 for communism to leave Cambodia. 

Cambodia slowly opened for tourism in 1995. Angkor Wat became a worldwide sensation. From the greatness  of Angkor in the 1100’s to the popularity which it enjoys today Angkor Wat seems to have come a full circle. Much like the local people which are called the Khmer who are once again smiling with tourism feeding everyone. 

Angkor at 1700 hours